How to Find Owner of Abandoned House

[Daniel Holloway]

There is a house in my neighborhood that has been sitting vacant for well over a year.  The grass is waist high and there are stacks of bills and "extremely urgent" mortgage notices from the bank piled on the porch.  From my research (looking at the name on the envelopes and looking up the property on the local tax assessors website) I know the name of the owner.  My question is, how do I actually find this person to contact them?  I am interested in either trying to wholesale the home or buy and hold it myself but I don't even know where to begin.  I am in the Greenville, SC area and brand new to all of this.  Any suggestions?

[Account Closed]

Call the tax assessor's office and ask how to get the address of the owner.  The address of where the tax bills go is usually public info.  Sometimes they don't give the addresses on the websites, but you can go to the assessor's office in person and get that info.  All they can give you is the name and address where the tax bill goes.

You can also go to the city/county recorder's office and get the info on who owns the land, and you should be able to get an address, too, off of any recorded documents for that property.  Any recorded documents are also public info.  But, you usually have to go in person to look them up.